Friday, June 21, 2013

The Jump

I've always had the greatest admiration for animators. When I was
little I was in awe of them. They were the makers of magic. Now that I’ve actually
had a taste of what it takes to become an animator my respect for them and what
they do has grown a gazillion-fold. Good character animation is extremely hard
to do.

It’s been a year now since I took my first baby steps into the world
of animation and completed that first Basic Foundations class at Animation
Mentor. Hard to believe I’ll be graduating in six months. I can honestly say my
time at AM has been one of the most challenging and rewarding experiences of my
life. At times it’s been a real struggle. Clearly, I still have much to learn.
But slowly but surely I’m making progress.

This past term I got a chance to play in AM’s production pipeline,
which was awesome.

I got to work on my first ever two-character dialogue shot, using dialogue from an existing source. My sequence involved four
different shots, so it was important to maintain continuity between shots.
Easier said than done. I gained a whole new appreciation for film editors and
their ability to make seamless cuts from shot to shot.

For our final assignment I had to film a video of myself making a
story pitch for a short film.

Next term we’ll vote on our favorite pitch, develop characters and
do pre-visualization in preparation for the short film we’ll be collaborating
on in our final class. The production process will mirror that of a typical
studio. It’s gonna be a lot of fun—I’m really looking forward to it!

A big shout-out to AM guru Bobby Beck for his unyielding commitment
to the school and his desire to make it the best it can be. His enthusiasm is
infectious, inspiring us to never lose sight of our dreams and to always keep
pushing ourselves to grow and learn.

Thanks also to all my mentors—especially my current mentor, Jason
Taylor. Super nice guy. He really helped me improve the quality of my work. Fellow
comic book nerds take note that Jason worked on the cool animation test for The Goon that came out a while back. :)

And of course, a special thanks to my fellow classmates, whose
amazing work and support makes me feel privileged to be part of their
community.